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Teldrassil is being destroyed and Undercity is being destroyed. So neither side actually "gains" anything. The Alliance tries to take the Undercity, but Sylvanas plague-bombs it. Thanks to phasing, only players at 110+ will see the changes, so your underleveled alts will still be able to visit them, but two Classic Wow capitals are going bye-bye.

Blizzard's only way of re-engaging with the "old world" is nuking it, apparently.

Yeah, but it worked for The Barrens. That was a huge improvement after they tore it in half...

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I agree. But I also think that there has to be something they can do (especially now that we have phasing and instanced sections of a map) to loop high-level players back into the old world in a more meaningful, long-term way. The change to how PVP is handled also helps, because if you DID introduce 110+ characters back into an old leveling zone, it wouldn't just be a killing field for Level 10 alts.

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Heh, I remember when Ironforge was the Alliance's main capital before everyone got an auction house. I still think it's weird to hear it described as an also-ran.

It's also weird that a certain Horde Warchief is sprinting down the path to becoming yet another one-note genocidal lunatic. Funny how we never get to invade Stormwind or Exodar to help depose a batshit insane Alliance leader.

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Blizzard released the "Warbringers: Sylvanas" video today, confirming that the Dark Lady has officially gone off her rocker without any real reason other than TPTB decided she needed to become the villain of the piece. I was kinda holding out hope there was some rationale at play here, but nope. Horde bad, Alliance good. We got it, Blizzard.

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Thrall was just too stable and reasonable. There's no way to write a story about that! Besides, isn't he just pretty much AWOL these days? Dropped his Doomhammer into the Maelstrom, you picked it up, and then he's just like, "Welp! Guess you were always better than me anyway," and peaced-out.

Ryokuro rolls his eyes SO hard.

I guess they're positioning Saurfang to take over the Horde once the Alliance catches up to Sylvanas or the rest of the Horde revolts or both. Maybe Saurfang will last more than an expansion as Warchief before he loses his goddamned mind too.

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I decided I was Team Saurfang from the first bit I played on the beta server. I mean it helps that he's been fighting alongside us since Outland, and he's a more developed character than most of the named NPC's in the game...

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That would work. I'm also kinda tired of the human leader being the incorruptible beacon of light and hope. It's boring and repetitive. I'm not saying make him/her do a full Arthas turn, but we all know humans (especially humans in power) are shitty both in real life and in WoW. Dudes like Medivh and Arthas are directly responsible for 90% of the bad shit that's gone down in Azeroth. Having the humans look squeaky-clean now is a pretty sharp heel-turn.

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Honestly, I can see where they're coming from work the Horde. They're the more monstrous races. In Fantasy, it's easy to make the monsters the bad guys. It's lazy story telling, but honestly I think they concern themselves with gameplay more than lore. I do think that turning Greymane into the villain would allow for Gilneas to be one helluva raid/instance

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Yeah, but most of WoW up to Garrosh has at least tried to paint the picture that both sides have good and evil in them. Both sides making choices that may seem reprehensible to the other side, but are at least internally justifiable. Garrosh dropping a mana-bomb on Theramore sucked ass, but at least we could weakly argue it was a military target. The burning of Teldrassil and the attempted assassination of Malfurion Stormrage are indefensible acts. Any Horde druid or shaman should immediately walk over either one of those things, with probably anyone that's not Forsaken following soon after. And as a player character, you're forced to be silently complicit or even actively participate in these acts.

I've already bought BfA, so I'm going to have to slog through 10 levels of story in support of a war effort that I personally -- and my character especially -- would NOT condone. (The unexpected dangers of pre-ordering.) Turning Sylvanas into an eyebrow-twirling supervillain is one dumb thing, but making Horde players go along with it until NPCs like Saurfang decide it's time to revolt (in the next content patch) is really shitty. Is there an achievement for this? "Congrats, you stood by for all the genocide! GG"

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Saurfang gets a pretty nice cinematic, but storywise it's just kicking the can down the road.

I played through the Alliance side of the burning just now. It sucked. I'm strongly leaning toward staying on Slovanova, my Draenei shaman, until something's done about Sylvanas, even though it feels profoundly weird to be in Stormwind again and I can scarcely remember where anything is. Truth be told, on the few times I played my Alliance alts, I always bound them to Darnassus.

Slovtora, my Tauren shaman and my main ever since Burning Crusade, will fly home to Thunder Bluff and wait for sanity to return to the Horde.